Hair and Skin Care Tips

Here is some info I put together when I was asked and so I thought I would also share it here with other soon to be adoptive parents.

When hair is very short (a few inches):
You will not need much for hair care while their hair is short. My daily routine when Tensae's hair was very short was just to spritz it with a combination of water and oil in a spray bottle (1 part oil to ten parts water, use a natural oil like pure olive oil or almond oil or you can buy a oil mix in the AA hair section). Then comb it with a soft bristle brush to smooth it out. If there are tangles use a comb, but buy the widest tooth comb you can find or it will hurt and pull at their hair. Avoid anything with gel or petroleum on the scalp because it clogs their pores and can cause problems. If the scalp is dry then rub a few drops of oil directly onto the scalp every few days but you do not want to overdue the oil thing either. Only wash their hair one time a week because it will dry it out otherwise.

Our current routine now that her hair is longer (8 inches +):
Once a week we comb it out and wash it. The routine consists of:
taking out any pony puffs, twists, or braids.
I rub oil on her scalp and into the dry ends
Wet her hair and apply a conditioning shampoo
Gently massage and rinse
Then I apply a detangling solution
Using a WIDE tooth comb and holding the hair at the scalp to avoid pulling I gently comb out the tangles (we still get tears often)
Then apply a high quality conditioner and let it sit for 5 minutes or so under a towel
Rinse and then take two strands in sections and twist together to avoid the hair tangling again
Some mom's find it easier to braid if they have blowdryed the hair but I prefer to work with it when it is very wet so I do not dry
Rub oil on scalp again and rub in
Use a hair lotion (leave in conditioner) and comb in using a bristle brush
Then use a hair styling creme to put in pony puffs, twists, braids, etc
If I leave it out natural then every morning I spray with a oil/water combo, put in hair conditioner and picked it out into a puff

Tips:
* Every night she sleeps with a silk hair scarf so as to preserve the hair style and reduce frizzing
* MUST wear a swim cap when swimming as chlorine frys her hair immediately, I also spray on a swimmers spray conditioner onto her hair under the swim cap
* I would recommend buying a book to learn about styles, there are many on Amazon.com
* Some AA haircare books recommend combing the hair out when it is dry but this did not work for us, we had more breakage when it was dry and way fewer tears if I comb it out when wet and full of detangling solution
* Stay away from products that contain mineral oil and/or petroleum as much as possible
*Stay away from thick pomades in the AA hair section, I could not get the stuff washed out of my daughters hair and it made it nearly impossible to comb out
* Everyone seems to have their favorite hair care products, I think it is trial and error to find out what works for your child's hair

My favorite products:
Shampoo: Pantene for Ethnic Hair (comes in a brown bottle)
Biosilk Therapy Shampoo
Detangling Solution: Biologe Detangling Solution
(This is a miracle worker, I buy the largest bottle)
Conditioner: Infusium 23 conditioning conditioner
(We love it!, Also buy the larges bottle)
Leave in Conditioner: Carol's Daughter Hair Butter
Carol's Daughter Hair Milk
(works good for natural all curly style)
Styling Products: Carol's Daughter Loc Butter
(My favorite, smells great, does not make hair sticky or hard to undo)
Skin Care:
The key with skin care for skin more pigmentation is to keep the skin heavily conditioned. Diet also makes a big difference. I use lotion that contains shea butter. Probably the best on the market is Lubriderm lotion with Shea Butter but it is expensive. I also use a bath wash that contains shea butter but during dry spells I use the Erythromycin soap free wash that is found in the face skin care section. If the skin becomes dry it will look ashy instead of glowing. Be careful of scabs, do not let them pick because skin is more likely to scar. If a scab comes off the skin will be light so keep it heavily moisturized and out of the sun until the pigmentation returns. If it scars the pigmentation will come back lighter or darker then the surrounding skin depending on the depth of the injury. Suntan lotion is a must because yes even dark skin can burn, tan and dry out. My daughter's skin tans in the summer even when I use a 40+ suntan lotion. If all the skin is irritated put oatmeal and milk in the bathtub for a soothing bath soak.

All this hard work pays off, my daughter is strikingly beautiful and I often receives comments on how healthy her hair looks. While she sometimes refers to wanting hair like her classmates, hair that is long and straight, these comments are less now and she is starting to tell me how she wants her hair done (twists, puffs or braids). I am committed to maintaining natural hair for her and then when she is old enough I will let her choose is she wants to straighten. No matter what the most important lesson is that she is proud of herself no matter if she has a bad hair day!

Ramblings on 9 pounds 12 ounces

That is the weight of my eldest son at his birth. He turned nine today. It is hard for me to believe that it was 9 years ago today that I was scheduled to be induced into labor. I remember the day very vividly, as if it was yesterday. In just his style, he was one week overdue, but finally very early in the morning the labor pains started without medical intervention. However, 10 hours later he still had not made his appearance, then at hour 15 of labor with incredible back pains the doc finally decided that a C-section was necessary. To every one's astonishment, he was born much bigger then expected. Turns out he was not in the correct position, thus with every labor pain his shoulder was ramming into my tailbone. I remember those first hours, days, weeks of complete exhaustion. There were moments when I never thought I would get to sleep a full-night again, yet alone eat a meal without interruption. You see he did not want to part from me and in my inexperience I did not think of buying something like a baby sling. I often find myself thinking of what I could have done differently. Had I known then that he was a "miracle" baby, the only one out of six pregnancies who would make it, would I have done things differently? Maybe, maybe not. I am glad that I did not know because I would have been more likely to overprotect him, to shelter him so closely that he would not be the person who he is today. He has grown into a remarkably intelligent boy, sometimes immature in his behavior but most often wise beyond his years in his thoughts. Tonight at dinner he was talking about what he would like to be when he grows up. You see he wants to build himself a house made out of Legos (of course he saw this in a book) and become a millionaire. I was a bit concerned by this, but when we pointed out that money is the not the key to happiness or the whole point of life, he clarified that he would use the money to help people, not to spend it on frivolous things. He then went on to explain how he is going to be a scientist who creates chemicals to save people and the environment. Hmm, I am liking this strain of thought. Then I ask my daughter what will she be when she grows up and she very confidently states to me that she is going to be a doctor who works in a hospital. I believe her. In her young life she has experienced pain which most of us cannot imagine and as a result she is strong willed, compassionate, intelligent, and there is not much that she is afraid of. I am sad that I was not there when she or Leo were born. That I do not have pictures of them as babies, that I cannot report the same memories to them that I can to my son on his birthday. But I can tell them what a miracle they are and how much their birth family loved them and we can guess together what they must have been like as babies. Because I understand that they are all miracles. Every single child on this earth, they are all here for a reason.

Long Day Paid Off

After a 2 hour drive to the Denver USCIS office, a nice 2 hour visit with the USCIS field officer, and a 2 hour drive home I am happy to say that our child's visa documents have been sent via expedited service to the National Visa Center who will then wire them to the US Consulate in Addis Ababa. Ethiopia. The bad news was that it turns out our file really did disappear somewhere between Denver and Virginia. We needed to obtain a new copy of our homestudy for USCIS and thankfully our homestudy adoption agency (International Adoption Net) answered the phone immediately and sent the homestudy to the field officer within 30 minutes. They also needed both my husband and I to sign a form and he was 2 and 1/2 hours away. So thanks again to the wonder of fax machines it was all taken care of. I am thankful that I had the day off of work anyways so I was able to focus on this and I am VERY thankful that a very nice family in town offered to babysit my kidos all day so that they did not need to come with me for this boring adventure in USCIS land. As a result of today's hard work we felt confident to move forward with booking our airline tickets. We will be leaving next Friday to arrive in Kigali on a direct flight on Saturday. We will be flying United Airlines out of Denver through Brussels and into Kigali. Now time to take a break for Thanksgiving before packing like a crazy person. We do have much to be thankful for this year!

If I Were a Visa Document...

If I were a type 37/39 US visa associated with a form I-171H resulting from a approved form I-600A just where would I be? Well I am supposed to be sent from the Denver USCIS facility to the National Visa Processing Center and onto the US Embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia as requested by my petitioner. But it turns out I am nowhere to be found! Apparently visa forms easily disappear in the immigration paperwork world. This of course is not o.k. with my petitioner so after she made every phone call and email possible with no response, she will tomorrow be driving one and one-half hours each way for a very coveted InfoPass appointment with the friendly Denver USCIS center. Please pray for her and for the folks who work there. Pray that she will maintain her composure and her patience and that the person in charge of the adoption documents at USCIS will VERY quickly electronically send the correct documents to the correct requested location. Why is this so important? Because there is a little boy in a orphanage on the other side of the world who is waiting for his family and his family would really like to have him home for Christmas. They have airline tickets on hold to leave next Friday which is close to the latest possible time frame to get the paperwork completed in Rwanda but they cannot book those tickets until I am sent to the correct location.

Sorry but my petitioner is just way to upset about this whole thing to speak herself.

Ours Forever!

We received news this morning that we passed court in Rwanda. This is the step that makes our adoption official in Rwanda so I am happy to introduce our new little man, Leonard! Leonard is the name given to him at the orphanage and we are going to keep it because not only does he know his name by now but Leo is also pretty darn cute. We will also retain his Rwandan family name as his new middle name. I think it is so important that he keep this important piece of who he is. Leo is currently 2 years and 9 months old and his most recent measurements have him at 37.8 inches tall and 27.5 pounds. That places him at the 95th percentile for height and 15th percentile for weight. Here he is looking not to happy about having his picture taken.

I hope he knows that he has a forever family who is busily preparing for him and very excited to meet him. We will be on our way to Rwanda in just a few weeks. His big sister is picking out Christmas gifts for him in the toy catalog and big brother is soooo excited to come with on our trip to Rwanda and Ethiopia. If all goes well, we will ALL be at home and together to hold a late Christmas celebration on my birthday, December 27th.

Christmas Gifts that Pay it Forward

In the middle of all the excitement of our adoption in Rwanda the holidays are also creeping up upon us. So I thought I would feature some great alternative gift ideas. I was looking through my most recent magazine from Heifer International, "The World Ark", and it featured a interview with Austin Bailey the founder of Tom's Shoes. So I did some Internet research and learned about this amazing and growing business that truly is all about paying it forward. For every shoe sold they produce and give away a shoe to a person in need in a specific country. The project started in Argentina and has spread to Ethiopia. They primarily choose Ethiopia because of the high occurrence of a specific disease that most people in the US or Europe have never heard of. It is called Podoconiosis. It is a terrible disease that is contracted simply by having a set of risk factors including not wearing shoes on volcanic soil. It is common in countries of East Africa and very prevalent in Southern Ethiopia where our daughter is from. Here is a video from Tom's that explains why they choose Ethiopia.



Now if you have been impacted, then check out the Toms website at http://www.tomsshoes.com/default.asp. Many of the shoes are made of organic cotton and they have T-shirts as well. For every shoe, T-shirt, or Hoodie purchased they donate a pair of shoes. What a great Christmas gift idea!

Heart and Soul Preparations

We have been on this adoption journey for almost a year and now we are in the full swing of preparations for what may be a trip to meet our son in a few short weeks! As I have previously posted I have been busy checking on airline tickets, shopping for new little clothes, and picking up the odds and ends that we will need for our trip. One thing I have not talked about however is the issue of accepting what has been given to you even when it is not necessary what you had planned for or expected. We had hoped, intended and prepared for the adoption of two more children, one under the age of 18 months and another up to age 3. It turns out that our soon to be son is almost 3 and by his height on the growth chart he is probably older. We are fully prepared for this, as it was almost a exact same scenario when we adopted our daughter from Ethiopia, so I have the whole toddler transition and age determination thing down pretty well. This is one area where being a child psychologist really helps! I am REALLY excited to get to know his personality and to experience so many joyful moments when we take him for many first experiences with us. The cool thing about toddlers is they do not hold back in their emotions. This can be hard when they are not happy but oh so wonderful to witness when they are overjoyed by new experiences. I am saying all of this because I don't want to give anyone the wrong impression with what else I am about to say. The honest thing is, while I am celebrating that we will soon have a new son in our family, I am also grieving that we will not also be adding a baby and second daughter to our family. All this time my children were asking about babies, and my daughter really wants a little sister. We even bought a new highchair, car seat, baby gates, all that stuff that we have not needed in a long time. Well it turns out we probably will not be needing that stuff now anyways. We are still waiting to hear if there is a possibility for us to receive a referral for a second younger child but it is looking more and more like this will be logistically very difficult. I am not giving up hope, so please pray that perhaps our son will also have a baby sister from his country of birth. In the time being we are preparing for and getting ready for our new big boy regardless of what happens with our request for a baby sister.

Getting Ready!

I had a busy weekend shopping for our little guy's clothes. I thought I had stored away more of my 8 year old son's toddler clothes but guess I got rid of nearly everything when we moved. So I had fun searching for good deals on little clothes at the outlet mall. My daughter loves shopping and did her best to help find the hangers with number 3 on them. I also have all of our donations organized in bins and am going to start packing them into suitcases. Some families actually check the plastic bins as luggage but it worked well when we used rolling suitcases in Ethiopia. We emptied the donations and refilled the luggage with souvenirs. I also picked up some travel essentials this weekend. I have a list of things in my head that were must have items that we brought with us to Ethiopia. Here are my must have items (of course this is not a complete packing list):

Ear plugs and eye cover (for air plane)
Tylenol PM (for plane ride there and sleepless nights before taking custody)
Chewable Pepto Bismol
Tums
Advil
Eye drops
Thermometer
Small first aide kit
Cooling patches (the ones for migraines that you stick to your skin)
Emergency C
Children's powdered electrolyte mix
Individual sugar free drink mix packets (hard to find diet pop in Ethiopia)
Infant or Children's Tylenol or Motrin
Children's chewable Pepto Bismol
Anti fungal Creme (lots! You will get ringworm somewhere)
Antibacterial spray (the spray works better in high humidity then ointment)
Hydrocortizone creme
Tea tree oil
Sunscreen
Medicated chapstick
Deet bug spray
Individual sealed antibacterial wipes
Hand wipes
Travel kleenex packets
Huggies pre-soaped and disposable washcloths (in the baby bath section)
A heavy shea butter lotion
Ziplock bags
Children's disposable plastic silverware
Children's disposable drink cups
Disposable bibs
Snacks
Lots of dried fruit (to make up for not eating fresh fruit or vegetables)
Children's yogurt/juice drinks to begin restoring the digestive system (in the baby food section)

Miracles in the Making

Well I slept of my grief over plane ticket prices and am feeling more hopeful today. When I think about the challenges that we have faced with this second adoption experience it feels sometimes like it has been a uphill battle but then it occurred to me that for every challenge that we have faced we have also experienced true miracles in the making. We have been blessed with people in our lives, sometimes complete strangers, who have went our of their way to make things happen. So here is a sample of people I would like to thank and miracles I would like to highlight:

• Thank you to our home study caseworker who completely understood when we called her after we had completed a international home study for Ethiopia and told her that we needed to change our country to Rwanda.
• Thank you also to our home study caseworker to introduced us to a family in our community who was in process of adopting a baby boy from Ethiopia. Turns out they lived only a few blocks from our home and up to that point we did not know one other person in our city who had adopted from Ethiopia. Their son is now home and doing wonderful! They have followed our own process in Rwanda and given donations to us for the orphanage.
• Thank you to our church community who has been 100% supportive of our daughter, our family, and our second adoption. They opened their doors to allow us to hold a fundraiser at the church this summer and nearly 80% of our church members should up to purchase baked goods, enjoy a African lunch buffet, bid on silent auction items, and brin donations.
• Thank you to one specific church member named Lesley who went out of her way during our first adoption and then this summer held a rummage sale for us and donated all of the proceeds.
• Thank you to our interim pastor who wrote us letters of support for a home study reference and for our grant applications. He looks great in the traditional Ethiopian shirt that he purchased at our fundraiser!
• Thank you to our general medical practitioner who took the extra time to complete our medicals and to the notary who ran to his office upon request to correct a notary error.
• Thank you to both our home study agency and international adoption agencies who have put up with my endless questions and updates throughout this process.
• Thank you to the amazing public nurse at the Weld County travel clinic who went out of her way to schedule a later then usual appointment to give our son his travel vaccinations and then to arrange a free replacement of his Typhoid pills when they went bad (our fault).
• Thank you to Laura, a adoptive mom in our same city who I was introduced to by the previous Ethiopian adoptive mom who I mentioned. Laura is looking into Rwanda adoption as well and gave us literally bins full of donations for the orphanage in Rwanda. They are a amazing family and truly we would have never met them had it not been for the previous chain of events!
• A preemptive thank you to the travel agencies who I have contacted to investigate lower airline tickets and alternative flight options to get us all to Rwanda safely without exceeding our savings account. I have faith that someone and by some miracle we will find a reasonable deal and that we will be able to bring extra luggage to carry the orphanage donations at no extra charge.
• Thank you to my employer, who while they may not be thrilled about me taking a extended leave, have provided me with enthusiastic congratulations and support!
• A big thank you to the other adoptive families who I have met on the Internet and who always seem to know the right time to drop me a note of inspiration or to pass on a important resource. The more adoptive families I get to know the more I am amazed by their resourcefulness and love of ALL children.
• Also a HUGE thank you to a friend who I have met over the Internet who lives in Rwanda. She has been a excellent source of information, a enormous support, and I cannot wait to meet her and her family in Rwanda!
• Thank you to my own family who has accepted our desire to adopt even when it did not always make sense to them and who love our children dearly. It is our family who has provided us the greatest amount of monetary resources to make adoption a reality and it is our family who come to stay with our children when we travel.
• And their are three remaining groups of people who have been in my thoughts constantly. They are the people in charge of caring for my children in Rwanda and now responsible for completing the steps necessary so that we can travel to get them, they are the very dedicated officials at the Ministry of Gender and Promotion in Rwanda, the diligent and loving nuns who care for the children daily at the orphanage, and most importantly our Power of Attorney in Rwanda who is tirelessly working on our behalf to advocate for our request for a second child and to facilitate the paperwork process so that we can travel to get our son (and maybe a daughter as well!)

It is through this and many other challenging times in my life that I have learned to believe in miracles. You have to look at the little things and then they are there. I don't believe in coincidence. People and things are placed into our life for a reason, we just need to watch closely and attentively to appreciate what is happening. I hope to teach this to my children, so that they know they are never alone and their is always hope for themselves and for this world. Today they will be experiencing a miracle as we go to shop for clothes for a little boy who they have never met, who lives on the other side of the world and who up to this point had no family, but now they call him brother.

Airline Sticker Shock

When we traveled to Ethiopia the first time we flew Ethiopian Airlines because they have a direct flight out of Washington, DC to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. We worked with a travel agent who specializes in international adoption and got a great deal paying around $1,400 each for our adult round-trip tickets. It turned out that spring time is the time for cheap tickets to Ethiopia! So a few months ago when we received our approval I checked the Ethiopian Airlines website for rates for the end of November (naively hoping for a quick referral) and was overjoyed to see a airfare special. When I ran the numbers adult multi-segment round trip tickets for a Kigali, Rwanda and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia stop were around $1,700. So today when I checked again to see what the numbers were looking like I was a bit taken aback. Seems that even though the Ethiopian Calendar is different then the US calendar prices still go sky high for the holiday season. The website told me that the current rate for a multi-segment round-trip adult ticket mid December to early January would run a whopping $4357. Ouch!!!!!!!

Best Way to Attach!

I stumbled onto a great blog put together by a fellow Colorado adoptive mom who is in process of adopting from Ethiopia. She developed a blog to highlight Ethiopian related products, but the cool thing is they are all items designed and/or produced by Ethiopian adoptive parents. Check it out at:
http://ethiopiaadoptionshop.blogspot.com/
The best part though is her own store where she sells hand sewn baby slings. They are absolutely beautiful! I am a huge fan of baby slings and baby carriers. As I have said before we even used a sling with our daughter who weighed 30 pounds and was 4 years old. She loved it and I loved it because she was safe and happy. And of course repeated experiences of feeling safe and happy in mom and dad's presence leads to attachment! O.k. so this sling from the store is my absolute favorite. It is made from material from Malawi and reversible. Hmm, do I really need another sling? It is much prettier then my current fleece pouch which has streched out......

You can check out her other slings at: http://www.small-wish.com/

Now I better buy one for myself before she sells out!

It's a Boy!

I had a overwhelming feeling that we would receive our referral today. I was up late and tossing and turning and actually checked my email at 1am, 3am, and 7am. Just when I was getting worried someone else posted that they had received their referral so I looked again and there was the email in my SPAM account! I am so glad I looked as my kids were able to see their new little brother before going to school today. I cannot post details, as in his name or picture, since we still need to pass court in Rwanda before we are his legal parents. I will say that he is in the young toddler age range and that he is extremely handsome, as in Michael Jordan handsome! He will fit in so well with my already two gorgeous children! It is strange after only seeing his picture for the last 2 hours already he is very much a part of our family. I love him dearly and can completely picture him playing about in our house. Thank you for all your prayers and thoughts through this process, now we just need to make it through court and then we will be on our way to Rwanda!

Clock is Ticking

It just turned 8am in Rwanda. I know Monday may not be the day but I still cannot sleep.

I filled the weekend with activities related to Orphan Sunday, a day devoted to raising awareness. Of course every day should be orphan day because their lives depend on it and the clock is definitely ticking when we talk about the health and well being of vulnerable children. Help can never come early enough. Here are some facts which I took of the ABBA Fund Website, authored by Jason Kovaks, because it gives a VERY good explanation of the numbers:

These are the most recent and reliable statistics on the global orphan situation.

• The most recent estimate is that there are approximately 145 million orphans in the world (UNICEF 2008). For this number, an orphan is defined as a child who has lost one or both parents.

• More than 15 million children have lost one or both parents to AIDS, over 11.6 million of whom live in sub-Saharan Africa.

• In 2007 67.5 million Children in South Asia and East Asia had lost one or both parents due to all causes.

• Included in the 2008 estimate of 145 million orphans are more than 92 million that have a surviving mother—-with whom they most likely live.
• Another 38 million have a surviving father.

• Approximately 15 million children are “double” orphans—growing up without either mother or father. That’s about ten percent of the whole 145 million.

• The UNICEF orphan numbers (145 million) are only for deceased parents. If you were to factor in single parents in general, we’d be talking a number many times higher.

• The UNICEF orphan numbers DON’T include abandonment (millions of children) as well as sold and/or trafficked children. Are the millions of kids abandoned in China not orphans?

• The UNICEF orphan numbers DON’T include many non-reporting nations (namely, Middle Eastern Islamic nations) where shame and divorce abandonment are rampant. 200,000 + orphans in Iraq, for instance, are not part of the count.

• I think we’re looking at a number quite higher than 15 million “double orphans.” We often communicate that the real number of kids that fall into our care categories is somewhere around 40 or 50 million.

• According to data released in 2003 as many as eight million boys and girls around the world live in institutional care. Some studies have found that violence in residential institutions is six times higher than violence in foster care, and that children in group care are almost four times more likely to experience sexual abuse than children in family based care.

• As of 2002 in Europe and Central Asia, over one million children lived in residential institutions.

• Worldwide an estimated 300 million children are subjected to violence, exploitation and abuse, including the worst forms of child labour in communities, schools and institutions, during armed conflict, and harmful practices such as female genital mutilation/cutting and child marriage.

• In the US there are approximately 500,000 children in foster care (Based on data submitted by states as of January 16, 2008)

• 130,000 of those children in foster care are waiting and available for adoption. Children waiting to be adopted include children with a goal of adoption and/or whose parental rights have been terminated. Children whose parental rights have been terminated, who are 16 years old and older, and who have a goal of emancipation are excluded from the “waiting” population. An individual child is included in the count for each year that he or she has these characteristics on the last day of the year.

• Approximately 51,000 children are adopted from the foster system each year.

• That leaves 79,000 children annually in the US needing an adoptive family.

• Each year, an estimated 20,000 young people “age out” of the U.S. foster care system. Many are only 18 years old and still need support and services. Several foster care alumni studies show that without a lifelong connection to a caring adult, these older youth are often left vulnerable to a host of adverse situations:

Outcomes
Earned a high school diploma 54%
Obtained a Bachelor’s degree or higher 2%
Became a parent 84%
Were unemployed 51%
Had no health insurance 30%
Had been homeless 25%
Were receiving public assistance 30%

Going into the Weekend....

No news of our referral today. I did not really expect that we would hear today but every day longer that it takes I worry more that we will not pass court before December. I think it is still possible as we have a amazing POA in Rwanda. I trust that she is doing everything that she can to get our kids in our arms as soon as possible. I also am faithful that the needs of our children are being met and that they know they are loved. My only lingering concern is that the Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion has several events this weekend and next week leading up to a very important event next Thursday which is a national meeting on the well being of children in Rwanda. The work that the Ministry's office does is invaluable and I know they are very busy so I just pray that there is still time to finish processing our paperwork next week. For the time being I am going to try and stay busy this weekend with adoption related events and enjoying the children who are in my arms now.

New Read for Sleepless Nights

I seem to be having a difficult time sleeping so I picked up this book at Target. Looks like it will be a emotioal read but very relevant to all that is on my thoughts. Here is the website for the book:

http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/features/sayyoureoneofthem/content/index.asp

Barely Breathing

We have received a update from our POA that the referrals have been approved by the Ministry's office and they are working on getting the paperwork in order. There may be signatures yet to complete and things that need to be scanned into the computer to be sent. Since there are 12 families going through this process that is alot of paperwork to manage. We were told that we will receive our referral via email directly from the Ministry's office and that it should be coming very soon. So of course my heart skipped a beat that it could be tommorrow but it very well may not be untill next week. The last time we were given a "heads up" from our POA that our approval letter would be coming straight to us from the Ministry's office we received the precious letter two days later. This is now officially leaving me feeling like I can barely breath so keep praying and thinking of us. That we will infact receive our referral and all the pieces will fall into place so that we can pass court before they close for the December break.

Waiting for Referral Families

Here are the blogs for some of the families who are currently waiting with us for their referrals. I also have them listed on the sidebar under Rwanda adoption blogs but thought this may clear up some confusion on who is who. This also might make it a bit easier to check in on all the excitement and joy when we all receive news! This is really a great group of people and being able to receive updates and share feelings with them throughout this process has been tremendously helpful. It's kinda like internet group therapy! I am nearly as excited to hear about their little ones as our own.

hunterandadrianne.blogspot.com
racksadoptionjourney.blogspot.com
bowersjourneyto.blogspot.com
sporesixgoingonseven.blogspot.com
thefurryrainbow.blogspot.com
cropffamilyrwandaadoption.blogspot.com
dorbandsonajourney.blogspot.com
adoptrwanda.blogspot.com

Third Party Update

I have some updates coming from various sources. Some other Rwanda waiting for referral families have heard updates from their Power of Attorneys that their referral information has been approved and is awaiting signature from the Minister of Gender and Family Promotion. Also the person in charge of overseeing the adoption applications will be out of office mid-week with other duties but will most likely be back in the office the end of the week . It is hopeful that she will be able to scan and email the referral information late this week or early next week. So this is good news, we just do not know the status of our specific referral since we have not received a update from our adoption agency as of yet. It was also confirmed to me by somone in Rwanda that yes the courts do in fact close for the month of December and that the reason is that this is the leave for the court employees, probably so that they can enjoy the Christmas season. This is all leaving me feeling like I can barely breath. I am so excited by the fact that there is a chance that we could have a picture of our new child/children just in time for the weekend. But I am also worried that there could be another glitch or we may not be able to pass court before closing. So please continue to keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

Faith....

Well I am worried, faithful but worried. News in our adoption group is that the courts in Rwanda close during the entire month of December. I am familiar with the whole court closing thing as courts close during the rainy season in Ethiopia. This is however the first I have heard that courts close for a whole month in Rwanda so I will have to do some investigating. There must be a reason because December is not a rainy season month in Rwanda. My worry stems from the harsh reality that if we do not receive our referral VERY SOON we will not be able to have our adoption approved by the courts in Rwanda before the closing. That would mean a extra month that our child/children are waiting in a orphanage over Christmas. Actually it would probably extend things out longer then a month since I presume they are very busy when they open back up. So this news is breaking my heart and opening up some pretty raw emotions. Thoughts and emotions that I best not share in this place. I do ask that you pray for our children, pray that they receive the love that they need untill they are in our arms, pray that the person in charge of approving the adoption paperwork is able to have the time to approve our referrals, pray that the technology is present for a speedy delivery of information, pray that there are no problems with our specific referral information, and pray that we are able to pass court before December.

There is a frame sitting on my dresser and it reads this:

"When you come to the edge of all the light you have known, and are about to step out into the darkness, faith is knowing that one of two things will happen - there will be something to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly."
- Richard Bach

I have experienced times of great difficulty in my life when everything was there that I needed to stand firmly, and there have been times when I have learned the hard way how to "wing it". I am faithful that this story will end with our children in our arms, I just wish that I felt a stronger ledge to stand on at this moment.